Don't You Forget About Me
by Mrs. Cloud
Summary: It was always the same dream: a weird kitchen and the eternal singing objects, this time a spinach can and a giant piece of meat. He would try to warn his friends, but they couldn't even remember him... Rated T for gore and language. May contain fluffybird (HarryXRobin)
1. The World Felt Like It Was Missing Felt

**_It's me again! I have another story on hiatus, sorry about that._**

 ** _Inspired by a Tumblr post FF doesn't seem to let me post here_**

 _..._

He wasn't dead. He was kinda hoping to die, maybe then they'd leave him alone. Maybe if one of them died, they would release them all. Maybe he had saved his friends by exploding.

But when he opened his eyes, he was awkwardly lying down, barely fitting on the floor of a dirty red telephone box, in a place with dull colors but somehow more real than his reality.

The whole world felt like it was missing felt.

He stood up and looked around, leaving the red box behind. The air was fresh, so much oxygen made him a bit dizzy. The grass felt itchy, but at the same time alive. The sky didn't look artificial blue, it was grey. The trees had no eyes.

He remembered this dull reality, but it still made him uneasy. It was like the life he was living before June 19th, when he was a normal red thing, when Robin was a normal duck and Manny a normal child.

Talking about normal children, a little boy similar to Manny (the same dummy smile and blue overalls) was staring at him in the rudest way.

"Is this the real life?" Red asked him, and the kid looked baffled to hear a giant red mop talk.

"I think so" the little boy replied

"Where are we?"

"London" the kid shrugged. "That telephone box wasn't here yesterday"

"Of which year?"

"Did you come from the telephone box? Like Doctor Who?" Red took the little kid by his shoulders. He hated when people wouldn't answer his questions.

"Who is-… Nevermind. In which year are we? Is it June 19th? Have you seen my friends?" he shook the kid's shoulders, but before he could answer, his mom called him and he left.

Red looked around, hoping to find something –a sign, a letter, a single green feather would do- to tell him about his current situation. Maybe the kid was right, if he had appeared with the telephone box, and if he went inside it would bring him back to his world, with enough time to fight whichever talking object was torturing his friends by now.

Of course the idea of going back to that hellhole was terrifying, maybe this time he couldn't escape, but what else could a red guy do? His friends were trapped there. They would have done the same for him. So he arranged his scarf and turned around to go back to the telephone box that somehow connected their world with this one.

But the telephone box was gone.


	2. Red

**_The last time I updated the document got corrupted or something... never had happened to me before._**

 ** _I'm very sorry. Does anyone know why is this happening? Please let me know._**

 ** _Let's start again._**

 ** _..._**

Slowly but positively, London got used to have a giant red thing within its inhabitants, as he got used to the real world. Coffee tasted better there. An elderly and probably senile couple took him under their wing, mistaking him for their giant English Shepard that had been lost for years. He lived on a tiny room inside their hostel, with a bed just big enough for him and a little duck, and a wooden box customized as a lovely bed for a little boy.

People at the hostel got used to this quiet red presence who always flinched a bit when asked about the time, hated the word "creative", stared at their chicken dinners with a distant and melancholic look, and didn't want to get near the computer. They even got used to his screams at midnight, though for him it was way more difficult to get used to the nightmares, especially since he had no green duck to hold.

The red creature also had a strange routine: Every day he would walk to the park, with the same decisive expression on his eyes, clutching his handmade scarf. People who saw him say he would stare for hours at the same spot at the park, waiting for something that hadn't happen yet. At night he would leave the park, go back to the hostel, fall asleep, and scream.

It was always the same dream: a weird kitchen and the eternal singing objects, this time a spinach can and a giant piece of meat. He would try to warn his friends, but they couldn't even remember him. He couldn't enter the house, at least not completely, only by bits. He would see Robin get increasingly anxious, and when he could finally get inside the kitchen, Robin would have a breakdown. And he would try to calm him down as he always did, especially since every day was June 19th, but no one would listen to him; then the weird noises again, and the screeches of his green duck, and the hallucinations of his confused little boy, and howls that poured into reality, and there would be a bunch of people outside his room as he went back to reality, where he had awoken the whole hostel. Again.

Slowly but positively, he got used to the real world. He started wondering if maybe the red box had been an isolated event. Maybe only if his friends escaped, he would see it again. _If_ they escaped, of course.

But he was mistaken.

One day, he didn't know when -calendars made him uneasy, always scared to see the eternal June 19th again- he went to buy some coffee for the hostel when a red glimpse of hope shone through the leaves of the trees. Skeptical at first, he ran inside the park, forgetting the coffee and his almost normal life in London, and feeling as anxious as the first day he escaped his world. Was it because his friends had escaped? What did they do? Robin was smart but weak, and Manny was strong but gullible. But maybe if they fought against the singing objects instead of fighting each other...

He didn't realize he was running until he lost his breath and stopped in front of a shiny, empty red telephone box.


	3. Green (Hello From The Outside)

_**Why are my files corrupting?! What the hell FF?**_

 _ **Anyways… This one fits with Hello, by Adele, though that was a happy coincidence. You can listen to it while you read. Or not**_

…

He couldn't remember being so anxious ever before, but there he was: his hands were shaky as he opened the door, intrusive thoughts of his quartered friends on the floor, but not one soul on sight. Only a pink Post-It over the blue earphone, with a number on it, the same number of the box.

He dialed the number three times before getting it right, cussing under his breath for getting it wrong, his hands were shaking so much... The third time, after the waiting tone, he heard what at that moment was the Most Beautiful Sound.

"Hello?" Robin asked on the other side. His shock almost made him drop the phone, but he didn't, and just hearing that voice made him feel home, but not the house where they were trapped, the other home, with chicken picnics and late nights watching their show or playing games, and the concern of the little creatures when he arrived late ("You're gonna catch a cold! But look! We made this scarf for you. Manny chose the colors.") and falling asleep on the couch, with the smell of clean warm feathers under his nose and the weight of a small yellow child over his arm.

But this was no time to get sentimental.

"Robin! You're alive! Listen to me: You guys are trapped. What you're living Is. Not. Real. You have to escape before..."

"Your call cannot be completed as dialed. Please hang up and try calling again" a voice that wasn't Robin's answered.

"Shit..." he sighed and dialed again.

Three times. In total he made three calls. Of those three calls only two were answered by Robin, but interrupted before he could even say anything. On the second call, a weird voice even told him to stop calling or "his teeth would go gray". But no sign of Robin nor Manny.

He had finally surrendered and was walking away from the box when a weird sound: a mix of a "poof" and the scratches of claws over glass demanded his attention. The noises came from inside the box. Fearing the worst, he slowly and shakily opened the door...

And a disemboweled green duck that had been holding on the door as if his life depended on it, fell face flat on the floor, splashing blood and organs and glitter everywhere, no way to see if he was dead or alive.


	4. Black

_**Hello!**_

 _ **As a very clevery guest pointed out, this story is also uploaded in Wattpad, where it is already finished. I'm the same person there, but with a different username, because I like clouds and cheese. There's also a sequel for this story there. You can go read it there, but I'll upload it here today, if you prefer reading it here. So, here we go!**_

The smell. Dear God, the smell. It was sweet and bitter, with the iron taste of blood, and a pinch of decomposition. Robin smelled of death, and Red had to swallow the vomit rising to his throat.

"Robin. Robin, wake up" he called, trying to sound normal, even cheerful. Was he dea-...? No. He couldn't be dead. All that outgoing personality, neurosis, intelligence could not be taken away so easily. They shouldn't be. He slowly turned the bird over his back, trying to put his organs in their healthy place, trying his best not to hurt him. He was his coffee every morning, his best friend, his nap partner, his... everything.

And now he was dead. Robin was dead and Red felt it was his life the one disemboweled in a mix of mud, blood and green feathers.

"Come on, sleepyhead, wake up..." he sang softly, like he used to every morning. And then when the bird would whine quietly, he would chuckle a little bit and tickle Robin's soft feathery stomach (what stomach? The same meaty sack covered with blood out of his body?) Until he would laugh and wake up (he isn't breathing, is he?) and make him coffee and bring it to bed (but he can't move now, he's dead, because you abandoned them at the mercy of the singing objects, it's all your fault, he's dead and Manny is next) and enjoy a few minutes of privacy with the caffeine and the duck running through his veins, equally addictive; until Manny would wake up and go to their room and jump on the bed demanding breakfast (Where's Manny? Is he dead too? Did they really kill a little boy?)

He wasn't a talkative person, but he continued saying comforting words, fighting back tears that won anyway; he didn't want Robin to feel scared. He remembered being freaked out when he got there, and he knew Robin was the anxious kind: the duck would definitely lose his shit in this world.

If he were alive.

But maybe, just maybe, he was alive. Red could have sworn to have heard really soft whimpering. Perhaps it had been the rain, though. Rain in their world was little blue felt drops, nothing like this weird thing that froze him to the bone; he was starting to hate rain. He got closer to Robin, touching his forehead, close enough to hear, to his relief, the weak and faltering breath of his friend.

He was alive, Robin was alive! But if he didn't stop shaking and crying instead of doing something productive, it wouldn't be for too long.

He wrapped the open wound with his scarf, the closest thing to gauze around. All the blood was nauseating, and the rain was freezing, and his own feelings were overwhelming. He took off his jacket and wrapped it around the duck who was flinching his eyes, his mind probably trapped in a past where there was no pain, numbed by the freezing rain and his own brain.

Bringing the duck back to reality, where he was probably going to die and where Manny was still missing anyways, was almost too cruel to be true. But if he could see those smart blue eyes staring at him for the very last time...

Robin seemed to listen to his thoughts, since he suddenly sighed, shaking his whole body, and slowly opened his eyes.

"R-red?" he covered Robin's beak with his hand, holding his head with the other.

"Shhh... Don't worry, you'll be fine" he assured, but he didn't know that for sure. "I won't leave you"

"You... you were the missing thing" Robin said faintly

"Please don't die. God, I'm gonna kill the fucker who did-"

"M-Manny... did it" the bird said at the top of his strength, and fainted.

Manny?! But there was no time to think about it. He carried his feathered friend, covering him from the freezing rain that had turned him a darker shade of red, the same shade of Robin's blood.

He didn't notice the telephone box had disappeared again in London's fog.


	5. Yellow

_It had been a long… day? Year? Life? How could it be that the sun had gone again and yet tomorrow it would still be June 19_ _th_ _?_

 _He had tried to sleep, but couldn't. After rolling on a bed that somehow felt bigger and emptier than before, he stood up and went to the kitchen. Hopefully the singing objects would be asleep._

 _Manny's light was still on, and when he knocked the door, a faint "yeah?" answered. Manny was drawing yet another picture of a clown; he had placed his sketchbook with the face against the wall, so it wouldn't see him drawing creative things._

 _"_ _I made some tea." Robin greeted._

 _"_ _You went to the kitchen? Did someone try to…"_

 _"_ _No, no one sang to me. Maybe they´re asleep. Are you hungry?"_

 _"_ _I don´t know. I could be lonely" Manny answered and the bird sighed, sitting on Manny´s bed._

 _"_ _I know, right? Lately I´ve been losing sleep. I have a faint memory of someone snuggling with me at night, but I have always slept alone, right?"_

 _"_ _I… can´t remember. If you want to, I could snuggle with you" the bird smiled sadly at him_

 _"_ _That would be nice. But something is missing. Like if our house were emptier than before… I do feel emptier than before. And now my bed feels empty too! As if someone was missing…."_

 _"_ _Your sp-special one?" Manny stuttered loudly_

 _"_ _Shhh they´ll hear you! I had a special one? I… can't remember anything"_

 _Despite beings such manipulative bastards, the Love cult had taught Manny a few things about love._

 _"_ _Everyone has a special one." The bird shook his head slowly, finished his tea and patted the bed, inviting the little boy to jump into it, like the good old days when they would have fun and jump on the bed, but someone heavier would jump with them, so whenever that person would jump, they would practically fly into the roof and it was fantastic and fun…_

 _Or was it all a dream?_

 _Robin had someone to snuggle with, but he still felt empty. No one in that room slept that night, they stared restlessly to the roof._

 _The next morning, still June 19_ _th_ _, food started talking._

 _..._

It had been a strange afternoon in the E.R.

A weird red thing brought a dying duck and the doctors had been too shocked to deny their help.

Robin was finally conscious, and maybe it had been better the other way around

"Red, please don't do this! Don't let them take me! They're gonna harvest my organs and feed them to Manny after they drug him and I will die again! Red, don't let me die! Please don't leave me alone! These cans will eat me!" He yelled, trying to fight the nurses taking him to the operation room. Red was running behind them. How he hated seeing the green duck so disturbed.

"Robin, they're doctors, they want to help you"

"Please don't leave me!" the duck shrieked, as a nurse injected anesthesia to his IV

Red ran fast enough to hold and squeeze his hand

"How do I know you're not a hallucination they're putting on me?!" Robin asked. He was crying but he didn't notice.

"I'm not. You're gonna have to trust me." Red replied, almost passionately. Almost

"Red" the green duck cried, letters slurred out of his beak as the anesthesia started working. "Red, don´t leave me"

"I won't. I'll be right beside you" Red assured, but when they entered the operation room, he had to let go Robin's hand. The duck whimpered.

"Red… I…" The man became a red blur, and the red blur became darkness. His hand was empty, and he realized before dozing off that it had been the same emptiness he had felt in that strange world where every day was June 19th .


	6. Blue

**_I'm so sorry for the delay, but I was in finals week, and the original chapter was terrible, so I had to rewrite it. This chapter is sliiiiightly nsfw-ish... Sorry about that. But I hope you enjoy it_**

 ** _..._**

A monotonous "bleep bleep bleep" was the only thing audible in the darkness, first barely there, then so loud it made him open his eyes.

It was dark and blurry, but he had been there before. He recognized the smell of blood and cheap disinfectant.

As his eyes got used to the darkness, he realized where he was. Red blood dripping from an IV. A creepy TV screen with only static.

He couldn't move, as he discovered when he heard steps and tried to follow the sound. He was sure it was another can, ready to open him and eat his guts all over again. This is it, he thought, this is my torture: sliced open to be eaten, sewn to begin again, over and over and... Red? Was Red part of his torture? What kind of torture brings the victim a memory of what gives them the biggest hope, their biggest strength? It had to be either the smartest or more stupid torture ever.

Either way, a fake memory of his most treasured person could give him enough strength to fight. A hand was coming close –he could feel it. He would grab the hand and break its wrist!

"Ouch, Robin, what the heck" Red complained, and the bird recovered his consciousness. The room was, yes, a hospital room, but a human one. And his friend was most definitely not a can.

He let go of Red's hand, embarrassed. Great, now he'd never know what Red was planning to do with that hand. Not that he would do anything similar to what happened inside the duck's dirty mind.

He swept his unfulfilled desires under the rug, like he was used to, and focused on his surroundings. The place was super weird, it was so un-fuzzy that it looked sharp, like testing a new pair of glasses after seeing blurry your whole life.

"Red? Where are we?" Robin asked.

"The hospital"

"That's not what I meant"

Red knew a storm was coming, that's what happens when you've been roommates for a while

"The real world. Remember, duck, we come from here."

"Do you remember?" Robin asked curiously.

"Yeah..."

How could he forget? Five years ago, before Manny could even say a long sentence, there had been a party. He had not been invited to the party, but he went anyway. He was homeless and hungry; and didn't have nowhere else to go. That's where he met Robin: an anxious and talkative duck who stood beside him the whole party, talking as he ate. He talked so frickin much, Red remembered, that the only way to shut him up was to kiss that yellow beak. One thing led to another and suddenly he had awoken next to the green duck, whose soft wing was clutching his bare red fuzzy chest. He remembered smoking one last cigarette –how cliche–, watching the duck's chest breathing in and out peacefully, before sneaking out.

He remembered the sign "Room for rent: name your price, my parents are desperate!" at the green and tiny Victorian house. He had no money but still got inside to look. What he saw were the same blue eyes he had seen before on a dirty bathtub, fixed on him as he skillfully undressed their owner; the same owner of the house, the same green duck who he never called again, the same freaking green duck who interrupted his speech about his late grandpa's house with the room for rent to stare at him with his cheeks as red as himself.

The same bird who didn't let him go again, giving him the room for free.

And he remembered the creepy neighbor, whose troubled son had been too much for Robin to handle, so much that one day he had returned from work to find an eight year old kid playing with legos in the living room. He said his name was Manny, even though everyone else called him Donny. With Manny they had had a family for a while, a real one, and it had been amazing, but with Manny some changes started, first so slowly (an earth globe out of place, a clock no one could remember to have bought...) that no one noticed, then so fast that time seemed to jump from December to June 19th, when it all started and continued, when a sentient Sketchbook started singing in their kitchen.

"And you, duck? Do you remember?"

Robin couldn't remember anything clearly, not even the party, which had fused with his dreams. It was like his whole life had been a dream, tons of days had passed and only one day on the calendar was left to remember.

"I don't remember much... Do you think Manny remembers something, anything before... it happened?" Robin asked and a dark thought clouded his mind "What if he doesn't even remember us?! Oh my god, we need to do something!" he shrieked, the electrocardiogram started beeping in a quick and anxious tone which matched the duck's heart. He started breathing really fast, if they had _ripped away his organs_ and baked them into a pie, what could they do to a little child?!

"Calm down" Red ordered, but as expected, it didn't work

"Don't tell me to calm down when our child is trapped in another dimension with evil singing objects!" Robin yelled

"He's not our child, Robin, he's the neighbor's son. And there is no _us_. It's either me or you" Red replied in a very sharp tone that left the duck speechless.

A barely new heart, broken so soon...

Red sighed, refusing to stare at the duck whose beak was as open as it could be. He waited for that beak to start talking fast and furiously, but Robin stood silent.

"Sorry Robin. I'm... stressed." He said, and sat at the bed. The duck remained silent.

"I'm worried too. But we can't do anything yet. You're too weak." Red offered, his monotone voice felt almost shy. No answer.

Red wouldn't say it so, but he didn't want to lose one member of his family trying to recover another. At least not yet.

"You said there was no _us_ " Robin tried to sound snappy, but he sounded sad instead.

"I'm tired of this shit. I just want to forget all about it."

Red wanted to tell him something more, but couldn't. _I don't wanna lose you. You are my family and living without you has been a nightmare... I remember the party. I don't want you to forget about it._ He wanted so bad to express himself in a more passionate way, he wanted to feel more passionately, like that duck whose new heart wasn't even one week old and was now beating so fast...

But he wasn't built that way. He could barely feel one emotion at a time, and the dominant one right now was dread.

"I'm sorry. We'll rescue Manny. But first you need to get well." He said and came closer to the duck, trying his hardest to turn his predominant emotion from dread to affection. He thought maybe it worked both ways: kissing the duck could make him talk or shut him up.

But he changed his mind, and instead brushed his hand against the fluffy feathery head, ignoring the beeps of a beating heart, leaving the confused duck behind


	7. Pink

"So... What am I supposed to be staring at?" Robin asked and Red let out an exasperated sigh.

Well, it was a decent park. He'd seen better ones. It was kind of lonely for that time, and it was raining. The air felt weird, like charged with electricity.

"This is the park where I found you." Red explained.

"There's glitter on the floor." Robin noticed and his friend knelt down and grabbed some glitter mixed with red bloody tissue and dirt

"Oh, that's mine. When I got here, I had to refill myself." He explained

"It sounds difficult" the duck muttered while he stuck the red bloody tissue somewhere under the red dreads. "But it can't be! The park where I appeared had a red telephone box."

"Exactly."

The duck stared at the empty park, trying to imagine a red telephone box from where Manny would come out and run towards them and Red would carry him over his shoulders and take Robin's wing and head home at last, a home where life continued its streak, a family of three, like any other family.

Robin tried to make the telephone box appear. Wasn't the mind a powerful thing? Maybe if he thought of a better place...

But no amount of thinking would bring Manny back and make Red love him.

"I have the theory that it only appears when someone realizes they're trapped." Red continued

"Like some sort of portal that connects our world with that weird place where time is stuck?"

"Yes."

"So it first appeared when you didn't return home and I knew something was missing! That something was you! And I heard your voice on the phone... but you only said my name. And suddenly... it all made sense. And... and..." The duck started shaking, holding his tummy, as if he was scared his organs would run away. The umbrella he was carrying fell to the floor, splashing mud everywhere, and he almost followed, but a red arm held him before falling.

Red held his wings, carrying the duck's weight. He didn't want to break his friend, but he really wanted to know what had happened

"...And?" the bird started hyperventilating

"And... And... I was in an operation room... And then not... And they did something to Manny, because he started acting weird, he's not like that... For heaven's sake, he wept when I killed a pesky bee, do you think he'd want to eat a pie made of... my... org..." He threw up and Red had to hold him to keep him from fainting.

"Breathe slowly. In and out" Red said holding Robin's shoulders and crouching over to look at the scared bird's eyes. He had to repeat this mantra at least ten times before the duck started to react again.

"I didn't throw out any organ, right?" was Robin's greatest concern. Red chuckled a little

"No"

"Manny was drugged. That's my only explanation. They drugged him so he could eat... me. But if I barely escaped, what if he... can't? And if I barely made it alive, and they took away my organs... What will they do to him?! Red, we have to save him! He could be in trouble! What if he's...?" Tears filled his eyes. He had been so rough with the poor yellow creature and now he was probably dead.

"Only if he realizes, the portal will reopen." Red explained.

"Do you think he'll ever realize?"

"No" Red admitted. Manny wasn't exactly the brightest brain in town.

"Maybe he misses us... Maybe he can't sleep at night, feeling something is missing, but without remembering what. And the singing objects will try to make him forget, and it will temporarily work, but at night, with no one to talk to, no one to tuck him into bed or give him a good night hug, he'll know something is wrong. That happened to me."

"Well, if he misses us enough, the portal would reopen. We just have to wait. We'll come here every day"

The bird sat on the wet muddy floor and stared at the imaginary telephone box. Maybe if he waited enough, Manny would, indeed, appear inside the telephone box, and maybe eventually Red would realize that all those nights sleeping together and waking up with tickles and sleepy smiles weren't just "friendly" behaviors. Maybe Red was being a bit too optimistic, too idealistic to believe one day, out of nowhere, things would work out.

Maybe he wanted to be a bit less realistic too. Whatever might happen, there was only one certain thing:

"I don't like waiting."

...

 _Time had passed; the biggest evidence was that it was New Year's Eve._

 _They didn't celebrate Christmas, they weren't in the mood. Red spent the night staring at an empty briefcase before filling it, sometimes drawing over a map. Robin spent his night staring at him from afar._

 _But they had been invited to a party at a neighbor's place._

 _There he was, feeling like the first time he had seen Red. The anxiety, a beating heart that wasn't his._

 _His real heart was on a pie, inside his best friend and protégé who was trapped in another dimension, and they had been trying to reach him for months with no avail. Betcha that kind of stuff is not a good ice breaker at parties._

 _His new heart, however, worked just like before, oriented towards the same red mop that kept messing with his head in more ways than many singing objects._

 _Of course he missed Manny. The kid was constantly on his mind. Nightmares couldn't leave, haunting him with images of his dead friend. Though nightmares were easier to handle when he would wake up to a soothing voice pleading him to calm down, softly caressing the feathers of his head. Because that's what friends do, they sleep together and wake up with each other's screams and nightmares, and they hold each other to calm down. And friends don't leave friends._

Friends _. That word felt like yellow cans eating his organs all over again._

 _But today that could change. That's what made him anxious. He was afraid of talking, hallelujah. He had seen a briefcase slowly being filled with clothes, and he was afraid that Red could leave without them. That was the way Red worked, he would simply walk away. That's what he did before, and Robin was scared he would do that again. He even had a speech prepared, and he was revising it:_

 _"Red, we've been trapped in another place for a while, and in that time we couldn't live our lives like we should. And I know Manny is still trapped, but we gotta get back to the life we used to have before June 19th. I saw the briefcase. I know you want to forget and leave but I don't want you to leave, I love you, and not as a friend. I don't think we are friends. Maybe you do, but I don't. Friends don't hold hands all day, nor sleep together. I know we slept together because there was no other bed left, with Manny at home, but... It's different. I know you've said before that we are whatever we are, and you don't care but I do care... But if you don't feel the same way, it's okay. You can ignore all I just said. Just don't go, please. Don't forget us. I don't wanna lose you... I've lost Manny already..."_

 _He sighed and drank wine. He could hear Red already,_ "Why do you need to label everything?" _but it was worth a try._

 _So he walked across the party to the terrace, with two glasses of wine under each wing. Red was there, with his beige trench coat and scarf, smoking a cigarette. Everyone in the party seemed to be having a good time, but they couldn't. Maybe they could never be normal again. At least not until Manny was safe._

 _The terrace was way quieter than inside. The wind was cold and a couple beside Red was making out. People had started the countdown to the New Year._

 _He walked and stood near him, but not too close. The cold was numbing, and he wanted to be held, like the couple beside them. He saw them kissing with all the envy of his borrowed heart._

 _"I... brought wine" he said, staring at the couple. "Do you want some wine?"_

 _"Thanks." Red replied with his dull tone and grabbed a glass._

 _This was it. The countdown was on 20._

 _"Red? I... need to talk to you. You see, I know there are better things to worry about, like Manny, but I wanted to say that I..." he started, but his speech vanished as soon as he opened his beak, so he just said what came to his mind:_

 _"Isawthebriefcase. Whereareyougoing? Areyouleavingus? Idon'twantyoutoleaveIloveyou"_

 _He said it that way, no spaces, vomiting the words like organs._

 _Red didn't answer. He didn't even look at him. Instead, he slowly finished his cigarette, staring mindlessly at the street below. Finally, he sighed heavily, smoke and fog spiraling, intertwining with his red dreads._

 _"I just want to forget everything that has happened" he said. Robin stared at him._

 _"But if you forget about them you'd also forget... me. And Manny" Robin said in a hurt tone, and, even more hurtful, no answer for a while._

 _"I'm sorry, but...I swear the minute Manny's safe, I'm fucking leaving this town."_

 _"Do you really prefer to pretend nothing ever happened instead of trying to learn about it? For fucks sake, Red, I almost died! Manny could be dead! And you don't give a shit about us! You only care about leaving us! We're your family!"_

 _"No you're not! You are just a clingy one night stand and a weird kid with an even weirder dad who somehow dragged me to fucking hell" Red said in a tone Robin had only heard when he was shouting at Colin the Computer_

 _That was the longest sentence he had ever heard from Red. Even Red seemed surprised by himself._

 _Only when he saw the big blue eyes shining like the most depressing and teary Christmas lights ever, he realized what he had done_

 _"Sorry. Robin, I... don't like having feelings. Life was easier that way." The duck didn't answer, but turned against him. He could see Robin fighting back tears._

 _"I don't want to forget you guys, but I don't like this" he tried again, to no avail. He tried to reach out and touch Robin, but the duck dodged his hand "Robin?"_

 _"Looking at you reminds me of everything I want to forget. But I won't leave forever" He suggested and sighed "Just tell me what you want, Robin"_

 _His tone was almost pleading, and Robin turned to see his pleading eyes, smiling sadly._

I want you to say we'll be alright, and we'll be a happy family like any other, and we can run away together

I don't want you to forget about me

I want you to feel like I feel about you.

I... want a lot of things, _Robin thought, and opened his beak to talk, but instead, he looked down to the street, where snow was falling and Manny was staring at him with his big goofy eyes wait, what?!_

 _"I want- Manny!" he yelled, and almost threw himself off the building, but a couple of red strong hands held him down._

 _"Whoa, calm down" Red said, with a less monotone voice "You can't fly"_

 _"He's... he was there!" He looked down again. He had mistaken a yellow fire hydrant for Manny._

 _"Manny is not here. I told you, he needs to realize in order to come back through the telephone box."_

 _"But... but he was..." Robin started and his own tears betrayed him. His speech, forgotten. He started sobbing. How could he be so selfish? Making drama when Manny could be endangered..._

 _The countdown was on 10, and a green duck had a breakdown. He fell to the floor, no longer containing his frustration, sobbing furiously. Now he was really crying and his tears froze all the way down and the couple walked away to keep making out far away from the weird weeping duck, who had fallen like a puppet without strings._

 _Like a puppet._

 _It was finally New Year, everyone started celebrating and Red lifted him up and held him against his soft, warm red chest. He didn't say anything, just held Robin tighter, his red hand brushing snowflakes off the green feathers of the duck's head._

 _Red could have said that he promised to come home someday, but first he needed to forget, and everything would be fine but he wasn't really sure. Robin wanted to say he didn't really care if Red left him and Manny, as long as the trio were safe, and that it didn't really matter if Red loved him or not, at least not while Manny were endangered. Love could wait._

 _Anyways, Robin couldn't love the red mop, and Red couldn't leave that town, at least not yet. Their lives would be at pause, as if every day were June 19th, until Manny's days stopped being that dreadful date over and over again._


	8. Blank Paper Day

**_Thanks for reading! As I said before, there's a sequel (kinda) on the works on Wattpad, where my username is Cheesedip1984 so you can check it out if you wanna_**

 ** _Thanks again!_**

* * *

There were weird people in London, but not as weird as _them._ For starters, they weren't human, but a red giant mop and a talking –and how! - Duck. Their house was weird too. It had two bedrooms, though one was empty: the green one, with pictures of clowns and a tiny bed and a desk with crayons and glue and colorful papers. They had no sketchbooks, no personal computers, no analogue clocks, no meat, only raw chicken, and no spinach cans. They had a calendar with just one date as a blank paper, between June 18th and June 20th

The day was Blank Paper Day, and they had been preparing themselves for that. Despite being almost summer, the weather was chilly. The red guy and the duck guy came out of their flat and walked towards a park that suddenly people had abandoned. The park had an eerie vibe, as if it was haunted. The air was colder there, that's why people had forgotten about it, as if subconsciously they knew that park was bad news.

Still, the duck and the mop walked towards it, both dressed with brown trench coats, the taller one with a yellow and green scarf, and the small one with a red and blue one.

If you could have seen Red guy's mouth, you could have seen his determined grin. Still, the green duck knew that it was there, under all the red hair. He could see determination in the other guy's eyes.

He wasn't determined, but scared. He was clutching Red's arm as a crutch, his wings holding Red's hand. Only the warmth of that red hand and the idea of seeing his friend again kept him walking, his stomach was twirling as if it wanted to secure itself to its rightful place, so no sentient food would take it away of its owner again.

Amongst the mist, seemingly out of nowhere, a red telephone box appeared, and the air grew thicker. Robin clanged to Red, anxious, and the determined grin turned into what could be a reassuring smile under all the red hair. Robin tried to smile too, but couldn't. Red was anxious as well, but not as much. He had been preparing for this; and no talking food or object would keep him from saving his family ever again. He smiled confidently and ruffled the feathers of that anxious little duck he found so damn cute. He wanted to tell the scared little duck that, if everything worked out, they could escape together, travel a little bit, and forget about the singing objects and the world of felt. God, he felt so confident he could have even shout his feelings for the little duck in the dullest tone ever.

Instead, he said:

"Don't worry. We'll save him"

And Robin nodded, not as convinced.

But Red knew this was the day he would finally save his family.

The Red Mop and the Green Duck walked towards the red telephone box, which vanished in thin air as soon as they locked the door, disappearing amongst the cold morning mist of London, in a cloudy June 19th.

Maybe the last June 19th they'd ever see.


End file.
